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How to Open Two Excel Files in Multiple Monitors in Windows 7

Question

How to open two excel files in two excel windows using multiple monitors in Windows 7.Currently it opens multiple files on top of each other on the same one monitor.

I found this article in a blog it says

"The snap feature that you are looking for will not work unless you open two instances of Excel. This is because Excel Unlike Word is not a True SDI Application. Microsoft is aware of the Issue however there is no resolution to the problem but the workaround"

Moved byDavid WoltersModeratorTuesday, March 13, 2012 9:03 PMmoving to a more appropriate forum (From:Windows 7 Installation, Setup, and Deployment)

Answers

I just did a test on my multiple screens, it worked. To do this, simply open Excel by double clicking the icon on your desktop and open the first Excel file you want to use. Minimize this window and move it to the right screen. Then go back to the desktop, double click the Excel icon once more, another separate Excel window will open. Open the second Excel file from within the separate window and move it to the left screen. You can open as many files and separate windows as you need using this method.

If you do not have an Excel shortcut on your desktop but would like one, find Excel in the Programs list. Right click it, point to Send To and then click Desktop. A shortcut will be placed on the desktop.

Excel 2007 provides a simple solution for users who want to open all Excel files in separate windows. To access this setting, open Microsoft Excel. Click the Office Button and then click Excel Options, which is down at the bottom right side of the menu. Select Advanced, which is on the left, and then scroll down to Display. Select the Show All Windows in Taskbar checkbox and then click OK.

I assume you defined the two monitors as an extended desktop. You can start excel for the first time and open a sheet and move the window to the first screen. Next you start another instance of excel open the worksheet and move it to the right sheet (you can only move a sheet to another monitor when it's size is not on "full screen".

The alternative way is open two excel sheets in one excel instance. Next you choose the tab "View" and click the "all window" option, then you can select that all the open windows should appear next to eachother. When you make your Excel instance a big as you're desktop (across two screens) you can see both of the excel sheets in one instance.

Works on office 2007, haven't tried in on 2003 but i assume it is possible.

All replies

I assume you defined the two monitors as an extended desktop. You can start excel for the first time and open a sheet and move the window to the first screen. Next you start another instance of excel open the worksheet and move it to the right sheet (you can only move a sheet to another monitor when it's size is not on "full screen".

The alternative way is open two excel sheets in one excel instance. Next you choose the tab "View" and click the "all window" option, then you can select that all the open windows should appear next to eachother. When you make your Excel instance a big as you're desktop (across two screens) you can see both of the excel sheets in one instance.

Works on office 2007, haven't tried in on 2003 but i assume it is possible.

I just did a test on my multiple screens, it worked. To do this, simply open Excel by double clicking the icon on your desktop and open the first Excel file you want to use. Minimize this window and move it to the right screen. Then go back to the desktop, double click the Excel icon once more, another separate Excel window will open. Open the second Excel file from within the separate window and move it to the left screen. You can open as many files and separate windows as you need using this method.

If you do not have an Excel shortcut on your desktop but would like one, find Excel in the Programs list. Right click it, point to Send To and then click Desktop. A shortcut will be placed on the desktop.

Excel 2007 provides a simple solution for users who want to open all Excel files in separate windows. To access this setting, open Microsoft Excel. Click the Office Button and then click Excel Options, which is down at the bottom right side of the menu. Select Advanced, which is on the left, and then scroll down to Display. Select the Show All Windows in Taskbar checkbox and then click OK.

The question could not have been simpler: How does a user open two excel documents.

Your solution is show different windows in the taskbar???

To Pieter:

The whole problem is how to open TWO DIFFERENT excel documents individually. Did you even try this before posting -- it's not possible. Your solution is to do just do it???

All the other responses here are useless as well.

I can never understand in forums when users don't understand how to answer a question, but then respond with a solution for a different question.

We want to know HOW TO OPEN TWO SEPARATE EXCEL DOCS. If you don't know how to do it, simply don't respond, and that saves tonnes of users from fiddling around trying to read all these comments from people who decided to comment, but NOT answer the question.

No, Justmesayin is completely right. The answer given is completely not helpful to me or anyone else who actually wants to know the real answer to the question. I doubt anyone who posted here even tried to find a way around this themselves
but instead justed openly guessed, or didn't read the question.

Well, I have to admit the information on this was usefull to me and realized there was more that I needed to learn so I have two other ways to help that may be useful

First my users wanted to open more than one excel app for each screen but also to twart any problems if a spreadsheet failed and they had to close the entire program for the other sheets that were not saved. So naturally the users experience counts
in my book and to try to help them out I created a shortcut on their desktop in Win7 and changed the shortcut key to Ctl+Alt+O so that when they needed multiple copies of excel they just needed to use the shortcut key to open a new excel program before they
open up the file in question. At that point they could use the list of last open files and keep this going for the user.

The second one was more easy in that I created a shortcut to the file they open on a daily basis and added the the root of where to find the application first followed by the link to the file where it was located on the share. However if the files
are changing this is not good. It only works if the user spreadsheet is the same day after day.

Here is where I got how to use the Windows keyboard to setup the link.

Hope this helps and thanks for the other info as well. I did not know about the multiple tabs to appear on the desktop since mine was not enabled it does show me the files now instead of trying to look for them in the view. Office 2010 is no
exception and its cumbersome to view the other files unless you know how to look for them. So in reference the user wins. It should be easy!

I agree with you. When a you double-click on an Excel file (such as in Windows Explorer), that file opens. Double-click on another Excel file and that file does not open in as a separate "instance of Excel. It opens in the window the first
file is in. Try to move one of those files to a second monitor - it won't move. As someone mentioned earlier (or in a different forum?), this works fine in MS Word, but it does not work for Excel because it is not a true SDI application.

I guess we are stuck opening the Excel application multiple times and opening the files individually within each window. Then, we can "Restore Down" each file and move them about the monitor and across multiple monitors.

I know exactly what you're asking, I haven't tried it with Windows 7 and 2010, we had the problem with 2007 and XP, used these free reg hacks to get it done. But I am going to test this with 2010 and Windows 7, see if the right click method still works.

My issue with this is, yes you can open two separate instances of Excel 2007 and 2010 open at the same time using this method. However if you have to compare data between the two workbooks, then you're out of luck. Features like the powerful VLOOKUP will
only work within the same instance of Excel, from my experience it will not work across each instance. I have situations on a daily basis where I have to compare cell values all the time on very large spreadsheets. I would love to have different\same spreadsheets
open within the same instance of Excel on each on my monitors so that I can easily see and compare these workbooks. It would make life so much easier (Which is suppose to be the point of technology...right?) than having to try to use the View "Features" that
MS has given to view each spreadsheet on one monitor. I will try the option of enlarging a single instance across both monitors that "Pieter Janssen" posted first to see if this will do. MS should have included a "Pop Out Window" feature that will allow you
drag this new window to another monitor. Sigh...

Prior to Windows 7. I would open 2 instances of Excel and move one onto my extended screen. (Doesn't matter how you do it (from the Start menu or a Shortcut). Whichever Excel you were "in" when you opened a new document would be the screen in which the document
would display. This is without going through Excel to File>Open and selecting your document. Obviously opening a document that way would display the document in that given screen. But before you could be in say the 2nd instance of Excel and click on an
attached document from an e-mail and it would open in that screen, Then you could click in the first instance of Excel and open a different attachment and it would show it on opposite screens.

After I upgraded to Windows 7, no matter which screen I am clicked in, All my documents open in the first instance of Excel. The only way I can get a document to display in the second instance is if I go through File>Open and select my document. This
is a problem for me because I review a lot of documents that are e-mailed to me - and I don't necessarily need to save them. Therefore I can't open through my documents.

Not sure if this is what the original question meant - but this is a problem that I am having - so any ideas would be helpful. Thank You.

Prior to Windows 7. I would open 2 instances of Excel and move one onto my extended screen. (Doesn't matter how you do it (from the Start menu or a Shortcut). Whichever Excel you were "in" when you opened a new document would be the screen in which
the document would display. This is without going through Excel to File>Open and selecting your document. Obviously opening a document that way would display the document in that given screen. But before you could be in say the 2nd instance of Excel and
click on an attached document from an e-mail and it would open in that screen, Then you could click in the first instance of Excel and open a different attachment and it would show it on opposite screens.

After I upgraded to Windows 7, no matter which screen I am clicked in, All my documents open in the first instance of Excel. The only way I can get a document to display in the second instance is if I go through File>Open and select my document. This is
a problem for me because I review a lot of documents that are e-mailed to me - and I don't necessarily need to save them. Therefore I can't open through my documents.

Not sure if this is what the original question meant - but this is a problem that I am having - so any ideas would be helpful. Thank You.

I am having the same problem that has been described here using dual monitors and opening mulitple session of Excel. The probelm for me come that I had a lot, and I mean a lot of excel shortcuts on my desktop that use often, so opening a new instance
of Excel and file/open is option but longer. I was hoping for a shorter way. :) I know those extra clicks are killer! LOL

The best thing that's worked for me is to use the "Send To" menu to open new instances of Excel for my dual-monitor Excel use. With this technique, you right-click on an excel spreadsheet file, hover on "Sent To" in the context menu, and select "Excel"
and it opens in a new window. Works with Excel 2007/2010 in W7.

To make Excel be an option in the "Send To" context menu, it's explained in this blog:

I know this post is old and that you are frustrated so hopefully my response helps. To open 2 DIFFERENT excel documents (in different Excel windows) that can be seen on multiple monitors, read the all the steps below first than do them exactly as
described and it should work. Good luck!!!

3. Drag the blank excel document you see to another screen - You should now see 2 blank excel documents, one on each screen.

5. From the blank Excel document on your left screen left click the Office icon (or shortcut if you have it), find the first document you want to open and select it by left clicking the document.

6. From the blank Excel document on your right screen left click the Office icon (or shortcut if you have it), find the second document you want to open and select it by left clicking the document.

Hopefully this helps. It should. The key is opening 2 blank documents in Excel first then opening the documents from each Excel window that you want to work with. Opening the files by double-clicking the files in their home folder will not
work.

You can also open the 2 blank Excel documents from double clicking your desktop icon. Another neat trick someone mentioned was opening the first document via the start menu or desk top than on the bottom task bar hover your mouse over the Excel icon and
click your mouse wheel. Again though, to view on 2 monitors you need to open the documents you are viewing FROM Excel, not from the file directly.

I had the same problem, have only scanned the results below, saw someone loosing his calm a wee bit, if the question is how to open two seperate files, one on one moniter and one on the other? its simple, I had the same problem 10 mins ago.

Basically open one of the documents (from your desktop or file location) lets say file 1 (list1) and drag it to the left screen the simply open the start menu and open excel on the opposite screen (things will automatically open on the last screen it was
displayed so you may have to open it from the start menu then drag it to the right, then just close it) then go to the open option on excell which will display file2 (list2) double click and hey presto..

If this is not what you wanted never mind.. i'm not going to spend all night reading the comments below, this is actually the first comment i've ever typed so if its wrong i'm not going to loose any sleep over it, and if its right... YOUR WELCOME.

If you are working almost the entire day in front of your computer at your office with lots of Excel Sheets and Word, then probably you might be working with a
dual monitor or may be even more than that. Studies have shown that having an additional monitor increases the productivity by 20 to 30 percent (Source: NY Times)

But some applications like MS Office Excel, even though you open multiple files, they are all from the same instance of the application. So if you want to compare two
Excel
files, then you may not be able to have it in two
separate monitors as the files are loaded using the same instance of Excel. If you move one
Excel
file to the other window, the other Excel files are also moved to the other window.

So how to have two separate Excel files or other application side by side in dual monitors?

Option A:

In Excel 2003, go to Tools -> Options ->
General tab.

Make sure the option, ‘Ignore other applications’ is checked. Now all the Excel files will be opened as separate instance and you can move the Excel files individually across the monitors.

In Excel 2007, Click the Office button ->
Excel Options -> Advanced.

Under General, check ‘Ignore other applications that use Dynamic Data Exchange’.

or

As this method forces each Excel file as a separate instance, the memory consumption will be more. If you don’t want too many memory consumption then you can open only two instances (see
Option B) and manage wisely to view in both the monitors.

Note: If you are having issues like Excel opens without displaying a workbook, then you may have to
uncheck this option. (See Microsoft Help for more details on this). You can use option B in this case. I have this option checked and I have not faced any issue yet.

Option B:

They key here is, the application has to be loaded as separate instances. Lets say you have opened an Excel file in
Monitor 1 and you want to open the next excel file in Monitor 2. You can usually open another instance of Excel by browsing through the
Start Menu -> Programs -> Microsoft Office ->
Excel. Make sure this newly opened Excel file is the last Excel file you had viewed and then double click on the Excel file that you wanted to open. This will force the Excel to
open
in the second instance of Excel. Now you can move these
two excel files separately across windows or monitors.

This may be little cumbersome way to open new instances of Excel every time. The easy solution would be to keep these links in the
quick links near the Start button. So, every time you want to open a new instance of the application, you can just use those quick links.

I think the problem was in opening two instances. Your suggestion states to "simply open two instances" and drag one to each monitor. I used to be able to do this in earlier versions of Excel but can no longer do so with 2010. The link
you provided is for 2007 so I'm not sure what the story is for 2010. I did have luck one time but I don't know what I did so it is possible. I have been able to do it going through the start menu but that's a bit clunky.

Sorry I've tried to propose an answer but I guess I don't fully understand how this posting works. So, I'm trying as a reply to your original. You can do the same thing with PowerPoint that Scotslad007 suggested above for Excel. I tried it and
it worked great.

Shift + Left click on the PowerPoint shortcut or

right click on PwerPoint icon pinned to taskbar and left click on MS PowerPoint 2010

The trouble with opening up a second instance is it does not allow formulas to work properly across the 2 instances.

We need a solution which will allow spreadsheets to be opened in the same instance and have different window positions (ie, side by side, across monitors). Alternatively we need excel to handle data access between the two (or more) instances correctly.

The solution posted by KrystleW is exactly what I was looking for!!!! I followed the directions to the tee and it worked on the first try. I'm looking at two different Excel spread sheets on two different monitors. Great solution and easy; thanks krystle!!!!!!
:-)

Download Excell Viewer (google it) and install it. After that, go to Start, Programs, find Microsoft Excel viewer icon and place it on the desktop. Now open first excel file simply by double click, re-size the window and place it on the right screen. then
open Excel viewer and simply choose file you want to open. You will have 2 files one beside other.

Nice! This worked great for me- great detail with the directions, this showed me exactly how to get there, and exactly how to edit the command parameter. Note: This also worked for me with .xlsx, and with .xlsm (macro-enabled) I would assume that if you
used another type of extensions (i.e. .xlsb for binary, then you could follow the same steps and you could also open multiple instances, but I only use .xls, xlsx, and xlsm which I would assume the majority of people use).

I am using XP (with Office 2010) at work, and that is mainly what I needed to open multiple instances up for, I don't know if it works on Windows 7, but I would assume that if you are using at least office 2010, it should work the same way. I can try it
at home, and let you know if this method works on Win 7.

I took this from another site, it worked for me in XP . Run regedit first.

Ok, this will be slightly complicated... first you'll need to browse down to this key:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\command
====================================================================
Important: At this point you should right-click on the Excel.Sheet.8 key and choose to Export to a registry file that can be used to restore in case something breaks. If something breaks I don't take responsibility! =)
====================================================================
The (default) value will be something like this:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office12\EXCEL.EXE" /e
And you'll want to append a "%1" to the end of that, making it:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office12\EXCEL.EXE" /e "%1"
Next you'll want to rename the command key, which is right below the (Default) key, to command2 or something else.
Next you'll need to rename the ddeexec key here to ddeexec2 or something else:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.8\shell\Open\ddeexec
This will make the change for the Excel 97-2003 filetype. If you want to do the same thing for Excel 2007 files, you'll need to make the changes to the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Sheet.12 key.
Here's a screenshot of the final way it should look (note that my excel install directory will likely be different than yours):
Once you do this, you should be able to double-click on excel files, and each one will open in a new window.

Click here then click there - right-click left-click hold down the CTRL key.... what wonderful functionality from an office suite that costs hundreds of dollars. What happened to the ol 'click a file's icon it opens the file, click a different file's icon,
it opens that file in another window', and why is it so bloody hard to restore this functionality?Microsoft you never fail to disapoint, just sayin..

I am not a defender of that Redmond company. They do have to design something that works for most but there are so many possible configurations and situations, so I think this is one of those that need some work.

I do want to thank those who share.

My issue was that I have pinned an Excel shortcut on the taskbar for easy lauch, but that also automatically put the second sheet on the same Window/Instance, and not letting me launch a seperate Excel sheet with that same shortcut. So I
could not move the second sheet to the second minitor.

To fix this, I unpin the Excel shortcut from the task bar, andput the Excel shourtcut on the Desktop, and that Desk top shortcut allows me to lauch as many seperate Excel workbook as I want.

This is just one of the many easy fixes. The KEY is not to put the Excel shortcut in the TASK BAR.

Ok, I got frustrated when trying to find a simple solution to this problem. My bookkeeper wanted to open two excel spreadsheets, each in a different window on a different monitor. Excel would not allow this to happen. By default, Excel
would open the new child windows inside the parent window.

This is a workaround and is not a seamless automated transition from default.

My solution was to go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office14 (for Office 2010) and find the EXCEL.EXE file. Right click EXCEL.EXE and Send to --> Desktop (Create Shortcut). Open Excel from the shortcut and drag it to the
second monitor. Open Excel again from the shortcut and leave it on the first monitor. Drag the first Excel file that you want to open into the first Excel window and drag the second Excel file that you want to open into the second
Excel window. Now you have two Excel files open in two Excel windows and on two monitors. I'm sorry that my instructions are not more clear or easier to understand, but I'm short on time and really wanted to share my find. If I have
repeated what somebody else posted as a fix, I apologize. I quit reading through posts at the time of frustration. However, my solution worked and my bookkeeper squeeled with delight. Hope this helps.

My understanding is that this is not a Windows version issue, it is a problem with Excel that they have recently fixed (Excel 2013). I was able to get it open twice, on separate screens and with separate close functions, by holding down the alt key
and right clicking on my pinned Excel icon. You then select the excel icon in the list (mine is Excel 2010) and a new instance opened right up. I found the instructions (granted for 2013) on the Office Blogs site and made it work. Hope
this helps anyone who's still looking for answers.

Then Right Click the Excel icon that opened
in your task bar if it is already pinned to the taskbar.

Select Microsoft Excel "2010" year could be different on your office.

You have two excel files now in seperated windows. Just drag it to your other screen.

And open the second file from the Excels menuFile Open

If it helps dont read the rest of this post.

Quote from helpful Dale which is already done in your default settings.

"Excel 2007 provides a simple solution for users who want to open all Excel files in separate windows. To access
this setting, open Microsoft Excel. Click the Office Button and
then click Excel Options,
which is down at the bottom right side of the menu. Select Advanced,
which is on the left, and then scroll down to Display.
Select the Show All Windows in Taskbar checkbox
and then click OK."

For the folks in the crowd who don't mind a little VBA to save a few clicks- I mostly prefer to open files in the same instance, for easier movement of data across workbooks. However, I have one business process where I run macros in several workbooks at
the same time and wanted seperate instances of Excel so they could work across multiple CPUs. I added this and linked it to a ribbon button, so I can just click the ribbon, select the file(s), and have them all open in new instances.

Sub OpenFilesInNewInstances()
Dim FileNames As Variant
Dim Msg As String
Dim i As Integer
FileNames = Application.GetOpenFilename(MultiSelect:=True)
If IsArray(FileNames) Then

You should be able to do this in one of two ways. Go to your desktop or your start menu and open two separate blank Excel documents using your Excel icon. Then move them so that each screen has a document. Then go to file or the home button at the top of
the document and choose open to find the one you want or select it from the recent documents list and it will open on each one.

The other way is if you have a document saved on your desktop that you were working on, open that and move it to the desired screen you like. Then either on your desktop or start menu open a blank Excel document using your Excel Icon. Then go to file or
the home button at the top of the document and choose open to find the one you want or select it from the recent documents list and it will open.

Hopefully that helps. If I understood your question correctly I was searching online for the same thing.

I know exactly what you're asking, I haven't tried it with Windows 7 and 2010, we had the problem with 2007 and XP, used these free reg hacks to get it done. But I am going to test this with 2010 and Windows 7, see if the right click method still works.

I have an account on Experts-Exchange, I may look there as well, it's a real p*&^ off, MS should have this built in. I know exactly what your issue is, we have it as well.

Until later .... Brett

This link worked for me with a slight modification to point to the correct excel.exe location. Get the
files from that link then replace ALL of the paths to EXCEL.EXE with the correct path to your
version of EXCEL.EXE.ex:change:[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Backup\shell\Open_in_New_Excel_Instance\command]@=”\”C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office12\\EXCEL.EXE\” \”%1\””to:[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Excel.Backup\shell\Open_in_New_Excel_Instance\command]@=”\”C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft Office\\Office14\\EXCEL.EXE\” \”%1\””

This has been killing me for years, and I'm so glad I finally searched to see if there was a way to do this. I now have three different Excel files open on 3 different monitors on a day that it will *really* help my productivity to be able to do that.
I can't begin to describe how happy and grateful I am. Thank you so much.

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